


And the River Runs On

by skieswideopen



Category: Forever (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-15
Updated: 2015-06-15
Packaged: 2018-04-04 13:53:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4140231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skieswideopen/pseuds/skieswideopen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Abe watches Jo come to terms with Henry's secret.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And the River Runs On

**Author's Note:**

  * For [csichick_2](https://archiveofourown.org/users/csichick_2/gifts).



Abe watched as Jo slowly circled the shop, like a lion on the trail of an antelope. Occasionally she paused, singling out one particular item and staring intently at it as if she could make it reveal its secrets--Henry's secrets--through sheer force of will. 

His attention was interrupted by a question from a customer about a rare Victorian side table. When she'd departed--without buying the table--Jo had honed in on an early nineteenth century chest.

"That wasn't Henry's," Abe said, coming up behind her. "I bought that at an estate sale last month." 

Jo jumped. "Oh, I wasn't..." she began, and then trailed off under Abe's gaze. She looked a little guilty as she stepped back from the chest, and Abe wondered how to tell her that he knew exactly what it was like to try and peer into the deep well of Henry's life, hoping for a glimpse of the bottom.

"So what?" he asked gently. "You suddenly decided to redecorate your place over your lunch hour?" He suspected it wasn't a coincidence that she'd chosen to come here now, when she knew Henry wouldn't be here. 

"No," Jo admitted. She took another step back and glanced around the shop. "So how much of this is from Henry?"

"Not that much anymore," Abe said. "I mean, it was all his stuff when I started, but that was over thirty years ago. I've sold most of what I could convince him to part with. There are only a few things left now."

"Show me?"

He nodded and led her to the khaki bag tucked away on a shelf at the back of the store. "This was Henry's medical kit during World War II."

Jo reached out and ran a finger down the red cross marking the front of the bag. "So he was a doctor even back then."

"I think he's pretty much always a doctor," Abe said. "Sometimes he dabbles in other fields, but he always comes back to medicine." It was perhaps the only consistent thing in Henry's life, although Abe liked to think that he'd done a pretty decent job of providing seventy years of consistency for his father.

"Was he really a gravedigger once?"

Abe laughed. "Probably." It seemed like a Henry thing to do, finding another way to get a little closer to death. He nodded toward the bag. "It's how we met, you know."

"During the war?" Jo asked. "You must have been just a baby."

"I was," Abe agreed. "Henry and Abigail rescued me from a concentration camp. They adopted me and brought me here."

"I'm sorry."

She sounded sorry. Genuinely sorry, not just rote. He liked that about her, that compassion. "They were good parents," he said simply. "I had a happy childhood."

Jo touched the bag again, and then turned toward him. "Can I ask...when did you find out about Henry? How did he tell you?"

"We were in a car accident when I was seventeen," he said. "I was driving. The other driver ran a red light and crashed straight into the passenger door." He could still hear the sounds from that day: Henry's warning cry, too late for Abe to do anything, and then the breaking glass and the sound of the car giving way, and worst of all, the strained gasping from his father as he struggled to breath, tried to apply pressure to his own wounds. "Henry, he, uh, he died right in front of me. Bled out before help could arrive."

"That must have been awful."

"Yeah." More than fifty years later, it still stood out as one of the worst days of his life. "Then he disappeared." Abe remembered that too, the utter shock of seeing his father's body piling onto the initial shock of realizing his father was dead. "Do you know what my first thought was?"

"What?"

"How was I going to tell my mother? What was I going to say to her? I mean, how do you tell someone that her husband's body has disappeared?" He shook his head, remembering his seventeen-year-old self's fear and confusion. "I didn't tell the police anything about Henry. Just said I'd been alone in the car and tried to figure out what I'd say when I got home. And when I got there, there he was, sitting in our living room with my mother like nothing had happened."

"That must have been a shock."

It had been, and not one he'd handled well. "Oh, I couldn't believe it. I nearly fainted on the spot."

"I don't think anyone could blame you for that," Jo said. "So that's when they told you."

"The whole story," he agreed. "He told me he'd wanted to tell me for a while. He just couldn't figure out how."

"But your mother already knew?"

"Yeah, apparently she found out the same way as me. Well, close enough. Except apparently he wasn't going to tell her at all--he was planning to sneak away and she caught him."

"So he never just...tells anyone?"

Only once before. And Henry had made it clear how badly that had gone. "You're the first in a long time."

Jo nodded, expression thoughtful, like she was beginning to grasp how select a group she'd joined when Henry had confided in her.

Abe told Henry about Jo's visit that night.

"Really?" Henry said, hanging up his coat. "I haven't seen much of Jo lately. Apparently she hasn't had any cases requiring my help."

Henry's tone was light, but Abe could see the worry in his eyes. He knew Henry had been second-guessing himself since the night he'd told Jo the truth. She'd handled it at well as could be expected at the time, surprised but not horrified, asking questions and listening carefully to the answers, but after she'd gone, his father had paced around the shop for a while and then retreated to the cellar, and Abe knew he was wondering whether he'd made a mistake. Whether telling Jo would backfire on him, would send him back on the run or worse.

"You have to give her time," Abe said. "It's only been a few days. It takes some getting used to, you know? Remember how long it took me?" He still cringed, remembering some of the things he'd said to his father that day. And in the days that followed. Anger and outrage and blame: for the childhood moves, for hiding it from him, for undermining everything he new about reality and how the world worked.

"It was a shock for you," Henry said, excusing that time as he always did.

"It was," Abe agreed. "Of course, it also explained a bunch of stuff once I thought it through."

"I'm sorry for how it affected you."

Abe shook his head. "Not your fault, Pops. You didn't ask for it either."

"Even so," Henry said. "I knew when we adopted you that one day I'd either have to tell you or leave you. Either way it was inevitably going to change things for you. And yet I kept you anyway."

"Well, I'm glad you decided not to leave."

Henry smiled. "So am I. I did consider it, you know, but your mother wouldn't hear of it."

"Good for Mom."

Abe gave Jo another week, and then when Henry still hadn't mentioned working any cases with her, he tracked her down and invited her to dinner for Henry's birthday.

"He usually keeps it pretty quiet," he said. "Too many awkward questions. But I figured since you already know, well, "

"I'm not sure--" she began.

"It'll mean a lot to him," Abe interrupted. Truthfully, Henry's birthday didn't mean all that much to him. Or if it did, he put on a very good show of not caring. But Jo being there, talking to him...Abe couldn't think of a better gift to give Henry than that.

"All right," she said. A little reluctant, but still agreeing.

One stop at a time. "Eight o'clock," Abe said. 

"I'll be there."

Abe had only been asleep an hour when the phone rang. He woke with a start and groped around in the dark until he finally managed to pick up the receiver.

"Hello?"

"Abe? It's Jo."

"Jo?" He sat up, world sharpening rapidly as he took in her tone, strained and a little frantic. "What's wrong?"

"Henry, he...he tried to shoot us and Henry...he pushed me down. He took the bullet."

Abe was fully awake now. "Is he dead?"

"Yeah," she said, the word little more than a whisper.

"Are you okay?" he asked. He flipped on a light and climbed out of bed, looking around for some clothing.

"I'm fine," she said. "Hanson got him before he could get another shot off."

Hanson. Abe's heart jumped. A good man, but not Henry's friend. Not the way Jo was. "Did he--"

"No," Jo said. "Henry...the bullet must have hit him in the heart. He was gone almost instantly."

"Okay," Abe said. "I'll go get Henry. You do whatever you need to do. Take care of yourself."

There was no sign of Henry when he reached the Hudson. Abe settled in at his usual spot, and gazed down pensively at the long, dark expanse of water below him. The drive down to the river had burned off most of the adrenaline generated by Jo's call, leaving him feeling tired and just a little old--something that he rarely felt, except when he was here.

A lifetime with Henry had created an irrevocable link between water and death in Abe's mind. Never mind that it was the place of Henry's multiple rebirths; to get there, he always had to die first. Sometimes before Abe's eyes. 

At least it was night. Late enough and dark enough that it was unlikely anyone would spot Henry before Abe got him safely bundled into the car. They'd be spared another embarrassing visit to the police station.

Abe turned as he heard a car pull up behind him.

"Hey," Jo called, as she climbed out. She wrapped her arms around herself against the wind as she walked over to Abe.

"Hey," he said. "What are you doing here? I thought you'd be dealing with paperwork." He assumed there was paperwork when you arrested someone for trying to kill a police officer, even if you couldn't tell anyone that he'd succeeded in killing someone else.

"Reece sent me home," she said. "Told me I could file my report tomorrow." She gave him a quick, uncertain smile. "And I wanted to see how you were doing."

"It's not like this is the first time this has happened," he said, trying to sound nonchalant. Truthfully, he secretly hated it when Henry died. Hated knowing his father had suffered, and hating how every time it happened, he was left wondering if this would be the time that Henry's mysterious protections failed. If this would be the time when Henry _didn't_ emerge from the water. He wasn't ready for that.

"I know," she said, moving closer to the water. She looked as worried as he felt as her eyes scanned the river.

"It's not your fault, you know."

"He's a civilian," she replied. "He's not supposed to protect me."

Was that why she'd stayed away? Because she'd realized how easily Henry would sacrifice himself for her? "Try and tell him that," he said. "Besides, if you die, do you know how long it will take for him to find someone else he trusts enough to tell?"

Jo shivered and pulled her coat closer. "I didn't really believe it," she said. "I mean, I did, kind of--I saw the pictures, and I know neither of you would lie about something like that--but..."

"It's hard to believe it until you see it for yourself," Abe agreed. "Or until you've lived with him for thirty years and suddenly realize he's never aged a day."

She nodded slowly, eyes still on the water. "Do you ever resent it?"

Abe hesitated. "At one time," he said at least. "I love him, I've always loved him, but there's a point when you first start realize you're getting older, that one day death will come--you haven't experienced that yet, but you will--and knowing it never would for him...I was a little jealous then." 

"Not any more?" Jo asked.

Abe shook his head. "No. I've seen what it costs him. How much it separates him from everyone else. I think he's probably the loneliest person I've ever known. I don't think I really realized how lonely until I got married."

Jo glanced over at him, eyes widening in surprise. "I didn't know you'd been married."

"Didn't work out. Back when I first started dating seriously, Henry and I agreed that he shouldn't meet anyone I might marry. I mean, how would we explain him to anyone who was around long-term? So whenever I wanted to introduce someone to my family--which wasn't too often--Mom would come out and have lunch with them, and I'd tell them my father was dead. I got so used to lying about it that I didn't even think about it anymore. And then I got married. Henry came to the service. Sat at the back where she wouldn't see him, and...I'll never forget his face that day, watching us with Mom and my grandparents, all together at the front while he sat alone in the back." He sighed. "I wouldn't wish that on anyone."

"He's lucky to have you."

"I'm lucky to have him." He looked down at the water again. No sign of Henry yet.

Jo caught the movement. "How long does it usually take?"

"It varies. He tracks it, trying to find a pattern, but so far..." He shrugged.

"He really has no idea how this happens? Why it happens?"

Abe shook his head. "He's been trying to figure it out for years. It's kind of an obsession for him."

"Well, I can understand that."

"I know," he said. "That's one of the reasons I told him to tell you." 

Out on the water, he saw something pale break through the surface, and relief rushed in. Beside him, he saw Jo focus in on the figure too, his relief mirrored on her face.

"There he is." He pulled a towel out of the bag at his feet, and glanced sideways. "Uh, he's usually...his clothing doesn't really survive the transition, so--"

She nodded in understanding. "I'll go wait in my car. Give him a few minutes."

"He'd probably appreciate that," Abe agreed.

"Yeah."

"He'll be glad that you came," Abe called after her. 

She turned and smiled, wider this time. "I'm glad I came too."

Abe returned her smile, and turned back to the water, waiting for Henry to reach the shore.


End file.
